Pitfalls abound in the mail

If your only impression of Cliff Ammon came from leafing through his mail each day, you’d probably reach one of two conclusions.

Either he’s about the luckiest guy around, or a lot of people figure he’s the most gullible.

His mailbox regularly is chock-full of official-looking letters that feature official-looking seals and official-looking words.

“Audit Bureau Letter. Please Open Carefully,” one envelope cautions on the outside. “It is advised that you do not misplace or destroy the important contents.”

Sure thing.

Inside, there’s a letter (stamped “Registered Document”) with a “Sweepstakes Audit Bureau Claim Form” attached. It looks a bit like a certificate or a check, and the figure $12,000,000.00+ appears in the spot usually reserved for the amount.

Read it carefully, though, and it says it’s a “Registered Notice Confirmation” and it is “for use by individuals requesting entry information pertaining to cash and prizes from US sweepstakes.”

The letter urges him to respond immediately so he won’t forfeit his “right to win sweepstakes cash awards of more than $12,000,000.00 guaranteed.”

Oh, and all he needs to do is send back the completed claim form and a $5 fee.

There’s a similar letter headed “official dispensation,” and a more realistic-looking check for $3,641,286.15 from an entity called National Financial Group, with a post office box address in Delaware. That one instructs Ammon to send a “one-time report processing fee” of $20 by cash, check or money order payable to N.F.G.

Ammon, a 79-year-old retired theater actor and director, didn’t respond to either letter or any of the dozens of others he has received with similar pitches in recent months.

Unlike many of us, though, the Saratoga Springs man sets them aside saves them. He finds them interesting. On a lark, he sent a bunch to me a few weeks back.

“I seem to get a lot of mail these days,” he wrote, “most of it junk; some of it really enticing.”

He got me thinking.

Do some folks fall for the implied promises in these mailings? Does anyone police this stuff? Are the senders breaking any laws? Do they fit the definition of a scam? Could they constitute mail fraud?

Sadly, it seems some folks do fall for these promises — which are, at best, misleading, and, at worst, probably outright scams.

E-mail and Internet scams get a lot of the attention these days, but other forms of so-called mass marketing fraud, including those perpetrated through postal mail, remain alive and well.

Certainly, Ammon’s mail provides evidence of that, and the U.S. Postal Inspection Service is part of a multinational team, also including the FBI, that announced a renewed fight against mass-marketing fraud in June.

The strange mail Ammon collected included a postcard purported to be from an “Annuity and Insurance Services Department.” Whose department, it didn’t say. It asked him to call a telephone number “to discuss your options.”

Ammon has no plans to call, and I wasn’t able to learn much when I called, but experts advise postal customers to beware of such come-ons. They can be devices to trick you into providing personal information that can be used for identity theft.

While there’s widespread suspicion that such fraud is on the rise, hard evidence is in short supply.

U.S. Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand of New York introduced legislation, which she called a “senior financial empowerment act,” in June to fight mail and other mass-market fraud.

The bill language cited FBI reports that seniors are less likely to report fraud because they don’t know who to report to, they are ashamed to be victims or they don’t realize they’ve been victimized.

Another factor can be fear that relatives will conclude they can no longer manage their own financial affairs.

I spoke on Friday with U.S. Postal Service spokesman George Flood, a former consumer affairs manager for the Postal Service in New Jersey, who advised that people with qualms about suspicious mailings file a complaint with postal inspectors.

“What we encourage people to do is bring it to the attention of the Postal Inspection Service,” Flood said. “Those men and women are the authorities on it.”

Maybe what you have is a genuine fraud attempt; maybe it’s just a poor business practice,” he said, but don’t worry about making that distinction before contacting authorities.

“Don’t even to try to figure it out,” said Flood. “Give it to the Postal Service. Those men and women are the experts.”

You can pick up a form at your post office or print one from the website and return it to your postmaster or mail it to: Inspection Service Support Group
222 S. Riverside Plaza STE 1250
Chicago, IL 60606-6100

Warning signs
Here are some red flags that could indicate a piece of mail is a scam:
You have to pay something to receive a prize or enter a sweepstakes
You’re told you are a “guaranteed” winner or there is “no risk”
The lottery is from a foreign country
You’re asked for personal or financial information, such as a Social Security number, credit card or bank account numbers.
There is pressure to respond immediately.
Someone wants to charge for a government service that’s actually free
An appeal comes from an unfamiliar charity. Check it out with the Better Business Bureau’s Wise Giving Alliance.
Source: U.S. Postal Inspection Service